i managed to steal some time yesterday to finally paint my little ika. while i knew all along she was a squid, i had no real vision as to how i would paint her… which didn’t exactly work out the best, but i’m happy enough with her for now. i must admit, i also played around a bit with post-editing in these pictures…

i’ve been ramping up in picture-taking lately because i’m trying to work on my skills and relearn things that i had previously forgotten while learning other new things…. sometimes i think back to Sherlock Holmes’ advice on useless knowledge from “A Study in Scarlet”:

“I consider that a man’s brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has a difficulty in laying his hands upon it. Now the skillful workman is very careful indeed as to what he takes into his brain-attic. He will have nothing but the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he has a large assortment, and all in the most perfect order. It is a mistake to think that that little room has elastic walls and can distend to any extent. Depend upon it there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones.”

see – me, i’m a capital fool, collecting all kinds of useless info on this, that, and everything in between. but on the plus side, it does seem to pour out at random times in my art to make for interesting designs…

anyway, back to the task at hand – the latest batch of photos! i just finished the kitsune’s outfit and a shoji screen, so of course had to take some pics of that, right?

the last few days have been stressful for me. it’s not that anything super majorly bad happened – but it doesn’t need to be the end of the world for anxiety and depression to take a toll on me. and since i was in tears within about 3 hours of waking up yesterday, i decided enough was enough and i needed a good therapy photo-session (once i found time, of course… )

but in the end, i do feel better and i think i managed to get some pretty amazing shots of kame in the process.

i made this cute little guy as a prize/thank you gift for helping us reach 750 likes on our Facebook page. we’re not there yet, but i still thought it would be a nice gesture to show people that we really do appreciate their support.

to be honest, we thought it would take us forever just to reach 500, so to be at over 620 right now is pretty awesome.

first things first – i’ve added a new bust piece – this time one that hangs on the wall – to our Etsy Shop.

secondly – we’re having a little give-away on our Facebook page. Help us reach 750 likes and be entered into a drawing to win a OOAK dragon teapot ^^ i’ve spent the last several weeks working on this fun little guy and i hope his new owner will enjoy him.

and lastly – a new shoot with plague! um… yeah, not much to say on this one other than life is once again weighing heavily on me… empathy is a wonderful skill to have, until you become so overly sensitive to pain that when tragedy hits, all you can feel is the suffering of others. being part of, and having friends in the LGBTQ community, it’s always a kick in the teeth sort of a reminder that many people don’t see us as humans simply because we’re different.

i've been drawing for as long as i could hold a pencil and art became my first language. though i've only been sculpting since 2007, i fell in love with the idea of being able to bring my drawings to life.
i am heavily inspired by medieval macabre artwork, japanese yokai, and oddly enough, sherlock holmes.
currently i'm living just south of beautiful portland oregon ^^